"Can't we just transform into rats so we could sneak better?" Diaval couldn't help but ask after hiding behind the curtains and letting the guards pass by for the umpteenth time.
Maleficent glanced at him, disgust plastered across her face and she quipped, "I hate filthy rats." Of course, she can't say that the real reason is that rats symbolize cowardice, and deceit, which immensely remind her of Stefan.
In her mind, that man is a rat, a coward who can't accept the consequences of his actions and someone who deceived her during her innocent days, bringing forth the Maleficent of today.
Diaval went silent and decided to keep it that way. Unbeknownst to them, Maleficent had a gist of why it's taking them this long to find Aurora's room. And whenever she's reminded of it, her face contorts into annoyance.
She knows well enough how curses work. Fate itself is doing its job to make sure the curse goes forward without any hindrance. Right now, it's probably delaying them from finding Aurora's room, either misleading them or sending knight patrols to coincidentally interrupt them
———
In the meantime, Henry was chilling inside his new not-so-jail room. Since he was already spending his time here for the next hour, he might as well make progress in his Anti-Dark magic spell. He sat up, glanced down at the notebook in his hands, and started jotting down notes and milestones he made from the process of creating the Anti-Dark magic spell.
"Magic and Mental cost. Or maybe I should use another source instead?" Henry murmured under his breath, normal magic spells use ambient magic as fuel and mental energy as the trigger. On the other hand, Dark magic spells, such as curse magic, use the same fuel but negative emotions as a trigger instead.
What if instead of negative emotions, he uses positive ones? Maybe he could use Harry Potter as a reference and use happy memories instead? Making it so that the happier and more abundant the memories are, the stronger the effect.
Thinking of this, he realized that the Anti-Dark magic spell that he was developing could be used more than just a simple cleansing of one's spirit from any taints of dark magic. Perhaps he could imitate the effects and visualization of the Patronus Charm?
'I wonder if this would be a groundbreaking magic spell in the magical side of this world? Teacher did say that there are no current counters to Dark Magic, at least not something as direct as this one…'
How would the sorcerers, especially the dark ones, react once they got the news that a new magic spell is the direct counter to all sorts of Dark Magic? Would they rejoice? Panic? Attempt to kill Henry and bury the magic spell along with him?
So many possibilities and the negative outcomes outweigh the positive ones. Yet, for some reason, Henry feels an undeniable excitement fluttering in his chest. It's like having the power to turn the entire world upside down, and you want to see people's reactions to it.
Before he knew it, he submerged himself in developing the Patronus Charm as soon as possible. Right now, right here in these dark and dirty dungeons, he's creating something that would no doubt take the world by storm.
———
Soon, more than half an hour has passed. Maleficent and Diaval have already climbed each flight of stairs, a painful slow journey to the highest floor. They avoided many troubles, such as knight patrols, some servants sneaking around, usually in pairs, and there was even an accident where the chandelier in the hallway fell and crashed on the ground, alerting most of the knight patrols in the castle.
"What kind of idiot designed this place? How come the stairs on each floor are separated instead of connected as one?" Diaval finally couldn't help but curse under his breath. Even Maleficent behind him was feeling frustrated, though she just kept it to herself.
'At this point, we only got a few minutes left before the curse kicks in…' Maleficent frowned. This is the work of fate, making sure that the curse meets its supposed outcome, 'Should I just wreck the entire castle and force things to go my way? But that would be too dangerous, I can sense Aurora on the highest floor. She's still unmoving so that reassures me a little bit.'
"There's no point dawdling. Once we reached the second-to-the-highest floor, we'll just—" Just as Maleficent was stating a plan, her eyes widened and she quickly bolted out of the room they were hiding in, confusing Diaval.
On the other hand, Maleficent was panicking because Aurora's presence from upstairs had disappeared. No amount of scrying could detect her anywhere.
'Is it already starting?' Maleficent glanced at the nearby grandfather clock and saw that there were only 5 minutes left before noon. Enough time for Aurora to descend the stairs and find a spindle to prick her finger on.
'This won't do.' Her eyes turned serious and in an instant, she finally abandoned all manners of sneaking. She raised her wooden staff and punctured a hole in the ceiling, causing it to collapse and make a loud noise that definitely alerted the entire castle.
Crumble!
Crash!
She turned around and pointed the tip of her wooden staff at Diaval and said, "Go loose." Before Diaval could blink, he quickly felt something warm inside him, gurgling and blossoming until he realized that he was slowly growing larger. Black scales with a smooth sheen slowly grew all over his forearms, which spread throughout his entire growing body.
The hallway that they were in was too small to accommodate Diaval's sudden transformation. As he grew, the walls finally crumbled, paintings smashing against his black scales, furniture being turned into smitheerens as his body was releasing an impossible amount of heat combined with his incredible weight.
At this point, the knight patrols finally gathered around, and when they saw Diaval, their bodies trembled, and their eyes widened as they shakily pointed their trusty weapons at the large figure that made the ones in their hands look puny in comparison.
One knight was able to utter, "D-Dragon! There's a dragon in the hallway!"
Before anyone could react, a sea of flames swam freely over the entire hallway, submerging everything and everyone in its volcanic heat.
Amidst the burning hallway, Maleficent flew towards the hole in the ceiling that she had punctured earlier.
———
Back in the dungeons, Henry snapped his head up at the ceiling, initially, he was confused but after that, he smirked, "Took her long enough. She should've done that in the first place. I guess she doesn't want to make a huge mess in Aurora's new home."
He snapped the notebook closed in his hand with a loud crack before tucking it away and approached the metallic door with three small bars at the top center, large enough for his face to see what was outside.
As he peeked, he noticed that the two guards from earlier were nowhere to be seen. It seems they deemed the commotion upstairs more important than guarding a Crown Prince. Well, they judged right.
"Any moment now, Aurora should descend here, mind controlled by fate or whatever to prick her finger…" It was fortunate that Henry could still remember a few scenes from the film. All that's left now is for him to wait for her. Once he detects her presence, he'll make his move.
Too bad the highest floor was too far for his senses to reach, especially since he's in a 20-foot-underground dungeon.
Just as he was about to go back and lie on the bed, he noticed that the locked door to the supposed room filled with the burnt and broken spinning wheels was wide open.
"Was that opened earlier?" He tilted his head in confusion. For some reason, a bad premonition filled his chest. With a not-so-gentle pull, the hinges of the metallic door snapped in half. He carefully set the broken door on the floor and walked towards the open room.
As he inched closer, he finally saw a shadow originating inside. He didn't need to think twice to realize what was going on and he quickly rushed forward. When he got inside, there was Aurora, standing in front of a spinning wheel with a dazed expression, her arms stretched forward as if to reach the spindle on the spinning wheel.
Henry burst forward, his figure quickly reaching for the dazed Aurora. However, he wasn't even close yet when something magical happened. It was a shockwave, coming out of nowhere and the force of it was enough to push Henry's entire body outside of the room.
In the meantime, Aurora remained untouched—until she finally pricked her finger on the spindle. At that point, all hell let loose. The surroundings turned chaotic, a strong wind current picked up out of nowhere, and exploded around Aurora. All of that happened in a single second until her body fell and touched the ground.
And then, silence followed, even the chaos from upstairs seemed to have come to a halt. Until a loud crack of lightning flashed outside followed by a miserable and spine-curdling scream of Maleficent that resonated across the entire castle, "NOOOOOOOOOOooooo!!!"
Meanwhile, Henry stared at Aurora's unconscious figure. So many questions were running through his mind. Such as how did this happen, what happened earlier when he tried to reach for Aurora, and lastly, how come he didn't sense Aurora's presence when she entered the dungeons?
He temporarily buried these questions in the back of his mind and pulled himself off the ground. He reentered the room and carefully approached Aurora. He was waiting for the shockwave from earlier to occur again, but when nothing happened after a while, he allowed himself to sigh in relief and carry Aurora out of the room.
When he stepped outside with her body in tow, the dungeon was already crawling with knight guards and King Stefan in front. His face was red and his eyes bloodshot.
"M-My daughter…" He muttered with quivering lips, his voice low as if his brain was still processing what just happened. Despite all of his preparations, unleashing almost all knights to patrol his castles, hiding the broken spinning wheels in a heavily locked room, and yet, his daughter still pricked her finger.
It was all for naught.
'Despite the huge flap of the butterfly's wings, the ending was still the same…' Henry reflected. One of the knights offered to carry Aurora's unconscious body. Which he gracefully accepted.
In the meantime, King Stefan's mind was spiraling out of control as dark thoughts were forming regarding the situation.
Eventually, he raised his head and coldly stared at Henry, "Come with me." This time, he's no longer afraid of provoking the prince in front of him. Let his entire Kingdom go to hell for it, he's not going to accept this shameful defeat.
When Henry heard him, he already knew what was going to happen.
'He wants me to kiss Aurora. Weird, I thought he already gave up, as expected of the butterfly effect…' In response, Henry nodded his head and he followed everyone out of the dungeon.
As for whether he would actually kiss Aurora, he had already come up with a good lie to avoid it. He can already sense Maleficent and Diaval hiding somewhere in the castle. Diaval's earlier draconic rampage left almost half the place in flames and all Ironmere knights working together to douse them, which is what probably gave them the window of opportunity to escape and hide.
'How troublesome. I was thinking of avoiding all this by stopping Aurora. Who knew Curses were more powerful than I expected…'